


Munin

by petvampire



Category: Anita Blake: Vampire Hunter - Laurell K. Hamilton, Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: M/M, Magic!Stiles, Only-kind-of-a-crossover, Post-Canon, Sexual heeeeeaaling
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-01-29
Updated: 2013-04-29
Packaged: 2017-11-27 10:49:35
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 17,832
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/661131
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/petvampire/pseuds/petvampire
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stiles has spent years training with Deaton to become the pack's resident magic-user, inking runes and spells on his skin. When a few of them react with... less than normal consequences, he finds out that he is capable of calling the munin: the spirits of the Hale pack's dead, the memory of their knowledge and their power. And one of them likes him WAY too much.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter One

**Author's Note:**

> This is a sort-of crossover with the Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter series, but prior knowledge of said series is really, really not necessary. What's mostly taken from it is a smattering of concepts, terms, and one particular character whose motives are pretty obvious.
> 
> I don't own either series, more's the pity. 
> 
> Unbeta'd. All mistakes are my own stupidity.
> 
> Enjoy!

_Breathe. Find your center; it's vital that you have an anchor._

Stiles sucked in a deep breath, although it was more difficult than it sounded, considering he had been running long enough that he had a stitch in his side, lungs heaving with the exertion. Focus – yeah freaking right, like he could bear down and center himself when he was fleeing for his life? He'd been trained for this, though, trained to drop into that pit of calm he kept in the back of his mind at a moment's notice, no matter what the circumstances.

_Belief is the key._

Belief.

It was a damn good thing he had enough solid, concrete evidence to believe in.

A sharp pain in his shoulder threatened to distract him, but Stiles didn't _let_ it. Who cared if he'd just been – clawed, it felt like, since there were now three distinct lines of pain pushing at his concentration – when he had _shit to do_? Running obviously wasn't working out well for him. He was still human, which meant he wasn't nearly fast enough to outpace the _things_ chasing him. Time to try another tactic.

Another claw scraped shallow across his spine, and Stiles locked his mind on what Deaton had taught him months ago and _focused_.

There was no flash of smoke, no bright lights and sound effects, but the creature on his back was flung back in a palpable burst of energy. Stiles could hear the yowl when it hit a tree, and distantly, a more familiar chorus of howls. To anyone else, it probably would have been unnerving, but to him, it was a reassurance; the pack was on his heels. They'd lost his trail, which meant they couldn't come to his aid, but now the pained squeals of the little beast chasing him would bring them right to him. Good. Stiles was hardly unable to defend himself, but it was beginning to look like he'd need a little help.

An angry screech shattered his focus, and his eyes flashed open to see more of the things coming, the whole damn swarm bearing down on him.

Okay, so maybe a _lot_ of help.

Just as he was making another attempt to concentrate for another assault, or more likely a shield, a blur of motion caught one of the little bastards coming at his head and dragged it to the ground, all howling furious teeth and claws. Stiles recognized Erica's long blonde hair; she'd proven herself to be a hell of a lot faster than the rest of the pack when it came down to it, probably a benefit of being smaller and lighter. The rest of the wolves were hot on her heels, though, and all of a sudden Stiles was surrounded by snarls and growls as the pack caught up with their prey, taking them down before they could take down the token human.

It didn't take long when it wasn't just him, and before long they had the little freaky things down, most of them savaged a little more than was probably necessary. Still panting, trying to catch his breath, Stiles surveyed the carnage, taking a mental count.

Twelve of them on the ground, plus the one he'd knocked out with a tree. They'd estimated about twenty of the damn things, a freaking infestation of vicious little murderers, so he had to hope the pack had taken down some others before they'd gotten here. The last thing they needed was to have to track down lone monsters when they were easier to find in the swarm they usually hunted in. Sighing, Stiles raised a hand to feel at the gashes on the back of his shoulder, grateful at least that the scratches seemed to be shallow.

Red eyes caught his attention, and he raised his head to see Derek approaching him, the wolfishness receding from his features and an expression somewhere between frustration and worry on his face. “What in the hell were those? Did you figure it out?”

Stiles resisted the urge to roll his eyes. No 'are you okay,' no visible sign of concern, just demanding answers, as always. “Deaton did, actually. Gremlins,” he added, shooting the alpha a look that very clearly said, 'no laughing, I'm not shitting you right now, this is the god's honest truth.' “Gremlins,” Derek repeated with a clear note of skepticism, and now Stiles did roll his eyes. “Yep. Tiny little bastards with teeth and claws who hunt in swarms because they can't take anybody down on their own? Yeah. Freakin' gremlins. And if anyone says a word about somebody feeding them after midnight, I will personally murder you,” he added, shooting a rather weary glare at the rest of the pack, who all appeared to be restraining laughter.

For them, it was just a hunt well finished. Stiles was the only one who had taken any damage. The little bastards weren't courageous enough to come after the werewolves, but a human used as bait they'd been happy to sink their teeth into. Stiles regretted agreeing to this plan more and more. Though he guessed it had worked, at least.

Apparently the claws had cut deeper than he'd anticipated, because his hand came away crimson. When he saw the blood, his head swam a little; it wasn't like he was squeamish or anything, but he didn't think it sank in until then, the fact that he was wounded. When it did register, Stiles found himself stumbling, the exhaustion of fleeing a pack of pissed-off demonic little gremlins finally catching up to him.

A firm hand on his arm surprised him, as did the look of concern on Derek's face when Stiles glanced up. He supposed he should be gratified the other was finally displaying an interest in his well-being, he guessed. “Are you hurt?” Way to ask about the obvious. Stiles would have had a snarky comeback ready – _should_ have – but his head spun again, sending him reeling far more than he should have been from a couple of scratches.

Okay. Miscalculation; clearly he was missing a variable here.

A lot of variables, because the next thing he knew he was on the ground, and Derek was hovering over him with a fear on his face he didn't think he'd ever seen before and Stiles' name on his lips, and the rest of the pack was clustered behind him looking worried and terrified, and then everything was dark and hazy and he was pretty sure he'd been thrown over someone's shoulder or something, but he was definitely moving. His vision faded in and out, but he was aware of familiar voices saying things like “What the hell is happening?” (Scott) and “Please tell me he's not going to die because of _gremlins_ ” (Isaac, that irreverent son of a bitch), aware of the leather upholstery in the back of the Camaro and a sudden cold shock that had to be one of the exam table at Deaton's.

“Poison,” he heard the veterinarian confirm, “They must have been a breed that produces toxins, but we should be able to-- “

“Not _should_ ,” he thought he heard Derek growl, though that gruff anger on Stiles' behalf couldn't be real. “ _Will_.”

That was how he got the first tattoo, and Stiles would never be able to look at the carefully-inked rune just under his left shoulderblade, a sign imbued with magic to repel poison, without thinking of fucking _gremlins_. Even when the rune got swamped and eclipsed by others, he would always remember that one, and how the whole thing had started.

Gremlins. The stupidest possible thing in the whole damn world, and that was what had set it all in motion.

~

Two and a half years later, they had all managed to survive high school and a hell of a lot of supernatural trouble, the pack was still somehow miraculously whole, and Stiles' entire torso was covered in the same kind of carefully crafted magical tattoos. The dark red symbols and runes extended over his shoulders, starting to cover one upper arm; he'd kept them in as easily-hidden a place as possible, since he still needed to be able to look presentable from time to time if he actually wanted to get a real, honest-to-god day job one day.

Right now, he wasn't worrying about that. He was waiting tables part time, taking classes at night, but for the most part, he had an occupation he'd never expected.

Deaton, when he'd explained the position to Stiles, called it a _vargamor,_ a sort of resident witch attached to a werewolf pack, to help defend and protect against particularly difficult or dangerous adversaries. He'd filled that capacity for the Hale pack once, he had explained, but he was mostly retired now. _Mostly_. Up until he found a promising student to take up the mantle for the newly formed pack.

That would be Stiles.

He'd first begun to prove he had a gift with the mountain ash, when he'd formed the circle and it had held, despite an initial skepticism. It was hard to get over some very logical questions and concerns at first, but once Stiles realized that _magic_ , such as it was, was a real thing that obeyed certain rules and laws, he had been a quick study. He'd helped the pack out in more than a few pinches, coached by Deaton, aided by his own flair for innovative use of power.

The runes had been one such innovation. Yeah, he'd been unconscious when that first one had been inked into his skin to banish poison from his veins in the absence of an antidote, but he had taken the last-ditch effort of an idea and expanded on it, made it his own. If the runes could retain their magic when placed on his skin, then couldn't he theoretically create protections, or lay down layers of power on which he could draw when he needed them, to prevent a need to prepare spells? It made sense in his mind, and when he got the first one done and it actually _worked_ , he had known he was on to something. Every time he stumbled on a rune or symbol that he might find useful, he ended up getting it inked on his skin, keeping it there just in case of an emergency.

Now there were about ninety-six of them, and counting. He'd keep it up until he ran out of spells or he ran out of skin; whichever came first.

~

  
Stiles had to admit, he'd never been particularly careful about the placement of the runes. So long as they weren't touching, the pattern was more for aesthetic purposes than anything else; he had no reason to believe there was any problem with that approach, since it had worked for him so far. That was how he'd ended up, accidentally, with three very separate runes next to each other, pushed perhaps too close considering the lack of space: _healing_ , which was a pretty obvious one, _memory_ (because he couldn't keep a freaking map of spells on his skin without a little help), and, on a slightly more dangerous note, _death_. That one had not ended up there as a just-in-case kind of scenario; he'd needed it once, and in the process of finding the spell to cope with the situation, he'd nearly gotten himself and half the pack killed. Stiles had decided to get it inked on him, just in case the need ever arose again. Highly unlikely, but he liked to be prepared.

The trio of runes had ended up right under his collarbone, almost over his heart. He never knew whether the placement of the runes took part of the blame, or whether it was just the combination. Maybe the runes had nothing to do with it. Maybe it was just his own _really_ bad luck.

Whatever it was, the runes definitely led to some... complications.

Yeah. Maybe that was putting it lightly.

~

He couldn't for the life of him remember what they'd been fighting. Some more shitty supernatural mumbo-jumbo crap, that was for sure, and they'd had hunters on their ass to boot who had blamed them for the havoc wreaked by whatever it was they were up against. Whatever it was, it had been dangerous. Dangerous enough to back the pack into a corner, to open Derek up from navel to collarbone and leave him bleeding nearly to death, the wounds not healing fast enough despite his werewolf powers. With the rest of the pack fighting off the remnants of their enemy – freaking _ghouls_ , he remembered now, nasty undead sons of bitches, which made sense, why the death rune had been sympathetically active – Stiles had turned his attention on the alpha, crouching by his side and pressing hands worriedly against the wound, murmuring the words that would activate the numerous healing runes he bore.

Okay, so maybe he tugged on the memory rune too, just to be sure he was doing everything he could. Maybe that meant there were three distinct factors in play at the moment that might not mesh. But Stiles had mixed his runes before, and there'd never been a reaction like _this_.

_This_ was a sudden acute awareness of the feel of Derek's skin under his hands, the slickness of blood under his fingers. Power pulsed through him, sudden and unanticipated, not the power he was looking for, but something different, darker. Stiles felt like his nerves had all fired suddenly, like his senses had intensified tenfold – all of a sudden he could _taste_ Derek's pulse on his tongue, the way his heart thudded too fast, pushing blood out only to drip free from his wounds.

Without thinking about it he shifted so he was straddling the other's hips, both hands pressed against his chest. It was less of a healing touch, though, more of a – _caress_ was too delicate a word, actually. Stiles was running his hands down along the tears in the werewolf's skin, feeling the way they fought to heal and were blocked by the corruption along the edges of the wounds. The alpha's expression was somewhere between pained and startled, and his lips moved, forming a question he didn't quite have the breath to voice. “Stiles – ?”

He felt the corners of his mouth tug up into an unfamiliar grin, and he bent his head to one of the wounds, taking in the curiously sharp copper scent of blood and flesh, the rot of death on the air. Nose nearly touching the top of the gash, he gave in to a sudden press of incredibly unfamiliar instinct and _licked_ along the open edges of the wound, tasting blood.

At the same time he pressed his hands against the broader gashes, eliciting a pained sound from Derek, and rolled power through him, feeling it tug the edges of his flesh back together, forcing the wounds to knit. All it needed was a kick-start; the werewolf's propensity for healing did the rest, the jagged marks melding back into smooth skin.

And Stiles was still pressed against Derek's chest, a shadow of something hungry and unfamiliar in the back of his gaze, the taste of blood in his mouth.

It took the werewolf physically pushing him away to startle him back to himself, to chase away whatever had come to settle over him, to push him back into himself. Spilling backwards onto the ground, he looked up at the other with wide, newly horrified eyes; the sharp taste of copper on his tongue turned nauseating, and he reeled away from the alpha to heave into the bushes, stomach rebelling at the idea of ingesting human (ish) blood. Derek was on his feet again in an instant, looking more than a little disturbed at what had just occurred. It wasn't like Stiles; it wasn't like _anything_ he was aware the other was capable of, and he'd seen a great deal of what those runes could do.

Hesitantly he approached the other again, not entirely sure whether it was a good idea to get close. Whatever Stiles had done, it had healed him, but that wasn't any kind of healing Derek had ever known. “You all right?”

The human looked up at him, eyes flashing, and for a brief, fleeting moment, Derek could smell the wild on him, the scent of woods and earth and pack. Then his eyes were their normal hazel again, his scent had melded back into something more familiar, soap and herbs and the sharp acrid overlay of magic. He looked sick, too pale and shaken and terrified.

“No,” he responded quietly, somehow managing to blanch even more as the word brought a fresh taste of blood across his tongue again. “Not even a little bit.”


	2. Chapter Two

“So?”

Stiles looked at the metal tabletop like it was the most important thing in the world, avoiding Deaton's piercing gaze. The man had a tendency to look at people like he could literally see through them, into their minds, rifle through the contents of their thoughts like he was browsing a magazine. It was disconcerting, to say the least, and Stiles _really_ wasn't interested in having the vet inside his head at the moment. He wasn't sure _he_ wanted to be inside his head at the moment.

A low growl from behind him made it obvious that it didn't really matter what he wanted. This was what happened when he hung out with werewolves; they started acting like he was subject to pack rule. He'd made his opinion on that very clear to Derek in a couple of notably unpleasant arguments, but somehow that didn't stop the guy from breathing down his neck whenever he put a toe out of line. Or _growling_ at him, which, _what the hell_ , because last time Stiles had checked, this was _his_ problem. Derek was healed. He was out of it. He didn't need to be all wrapped up in Stiles' attempts to have a conversation about what the crap had just happened with his teacher.

Heaving an exasperated sigh, Stiles tipped his gaze up towards Deaton, raising his eyebrows. “Okay. I had a... slight malfunction with one of my healing runes.” His tone was casual, or as much so as he could make it, considering he was still a little shaken. Licking an open, ghoul-corrupted wound would do that to a guy.

“Slight?” The sarcasm in Derek's voice was thick enough to walk on. “I've never seen anything like that, Stiles. Not from anyone _human_.”

Deaton raised his eyebrows at both of them, waiting.

Shaking his head, Stiles raised a hand, raking fingers through his hair. He'd grown out the buzz-cut in the last couple of years, though the longer hair didn't make him look any less gawky, any more adult. Just slightly more unkempt, since he was constantly messing it up, either through his habitual nervous gestures or because he ended up being chased, assaulted, and chomped on by supernatural beasties more often than not. “Yeah, well, it wasn't intentional.” He sounded defensive even to himself, which couldn't be a good thing.

“Is one of you going to tell me what actually happened, or not? I don't have all night.” Though the sometimes-vet, sometimes-witch-doctor didn't sound particularly peeved. Neutral, he was always neutral, but the look in his eyes was keen and interested. Deaton always took a particular interest in anything bizarre or out-of-whack regarding Stiles' magic, most likely because he was still waiting for the guy to blow himself up somehow and trying his damnedest to prevent it. Somehow they'd both managed to survive this long.

Another sigh. “I, uh... Derek got pretty badly ripped up by some ghouls. I healed him.”

“How, exactly, is that out of the ordinary? Healing's not unusual for you.” True. Stiles didn't really _want_ to elaborate, but if he wanted an answer...

“I'm... not sure exactly.” Stiles had stopped being embarrassed about a good many things after hanging around the pack for so long, but he still colored a little, looked down at the lab table again. “But it was kind of... physical.”

“Define 'kind of physical.'”

“Like, half a heartbeat from making out with an open wound.”

“... ah.” Deaton's response was predictably dry, but Stiles knew him better than that. The vet knew something. Hell, he _always_ knew something.

“He smelled like pack,” Derek chimed in, voice holding that tone of 'I-know-something-deep-dark-and-important-that-you-don't' that drove Stiles up a wall. “And I thought I saw his eyes change.” Okay, _that_ Stiles hadn't know. But Derek had lost a lot of blood; he could have been hallucinating. Or just freaking out since he'd been healed via sexual assault. It was entirely possible he had just been seeing, and, uh, _smelling_ things.

Of course, by the look on Deaton's face, it wasn't that simple. It never was.

The vet didn't say anything, just stepped over to the bookshelf that held the less-strictly-medical collection he'd amassed over the years. Great, so now they got to sit here and let the dramatic tension build while Deaton researched. Stiles dropped his head into his hands, pressing thumbs against his temples. He was feeling a little more drained than usual after his unorthodox expenditure of power, which he didn't know how to take. Could be good, since it might mean it was just a fluke; could be bad. Like, _real_ bad. That sort of depended on what Deaton came back with.

Derek was still lurking, a sulky presence behind his left shoulder, but Stiles was determinedly ignoring him. So far as he was concerned, this was none of the werewolf's business. He'd thrown his two cents in on what happened. He didn't need to be here to find out what the issue was.

… okay, maybe that wasn't _quite_ true. Stiles' magical quirks and issues impacted the pack, after all. But only so far as he let them. Whatever this was, it was just something he had to figure out and learn how to control, and then they'd never have to deal with it again. End of story.

Probably.

Deaton returned in what had to be record time, which meant he'd already had an idea of what was going on, he was just confirming it with written evidence. So there wasn't an issue. If the vet knew what he was dealing with, he'd know how to shut it down. But he looked... still neutral, but kind of grim, to those who knew how to read his cryptic expressions.

“The ability to call flesh is a fairly rare talent, even among people more... supernaturally inclined than yourself,” he started, leading Stiles to lift his head again, giving the man a blank stare. He didn't know what the hell Deaton was talking about, but then, that happened a lot. Things always cleared up... eventually. “For a human to have it is all but impossible. For you to have tapped into it, I believe you may have found a way to call the munin.”

“The _what_?” Nope, no clarification, evidently; Stiles still didn't know what the hell Deaton was talking about.

But to judge by the quiet stream of cursing from behind him, Derek did.

 

~

 

Trudging back out into the woods for the middle of the night was _not_ what Stiles had in mind. He was exhausted, and felt like hell. They'd been monster fighting, then talking magic mumbo-jumbo. All he wanted was a couple hours' sleep and a little time to digest the night's weirdness, not another freaking trip out into the wild. But here he was, lagging behind as Derek cut a path through the trees, silent but very obviously unhappy about something. Stiles could read it in the set of his shoulders, the almost aura of anger that radiated from him. And here he'd thought Derek had gotten _less_ grumpy over the years. All it took was a magical misstep to send him back into sulk-mode.

Stiles had thought he'd known all the various hidey-holes the pack had in the Beacon Hills Reserve, but he had absolutely no idea where Derek was going. He was going way, _way_ off the beaten path, cutting through the underbrush in a way that had Stiles cursing under his breath as he followed him. He didn't have preternatural werewolf powers to help him move though the woods, so his jeans were catching on twigs and branches, getting him tangled up and covered in bits of plant matter. Usually he was better at this, but tonight he was just tired. Whatever power he'd had that had connected him to the pack earlier, it had clearly deserted him.

Finally he stumbled into a clearing, gritting his teeth and straightening himself up to look at Derek standing there, arms crossed over his chest, eyes dark and judging. “Well?” Stiles sounded like he was at the end of his rope, fed up with the fact that he'd been dragged out here this damn late. Or early, rather; he could feel the tug of the dawn, the sun breaking over the horizon. He'd learned to attune himself to the rise and fall of the sun – a lot of big bad creatures only came out in the dark, so he'd learned to keep track of it.

Derek just gestured, movement sharp and harsh, at a tree on the far side of the clearing. It was a wide, branching cypress, not exactly an unfamiliar sight for this area, though it seemed to be rather larger than most of the other trees around it. And there was something else to it – a feel, an energy it gave off, like a hum just below his capacity to hear it. Moving closer, Stiles saw that there were runes carved into the roots and trunk of the tree, etched so carefully that from a distance, they blended into the bark. Or maybe that was just part of the magic, a way to disguise them from the casual viewer.

He was hardly casual, and whatever the hell this was, it was magic. Since Derek had dragged him all this way out here, he had to assume it had something to do with their little... _situation_ earlier.

“What do you see?” The werewolf's voice was cool, even. Guarded. He hadn't taken that tone with Stiles for a long time; it was a little disconcerting. Scraping fingers through his hair again, he shrugged a little helplessly, tilting his head to try and decipher the runes. They were old, older than the ones inked on his skin. Nothing he knew the meaning of. “A big-ass magic tree? I don't know, man, so can you please just tell me what the hell we're here for?”

Derek seemed to bristle a little at Stiles' lack of reverence, though he should have been used to it by now. Biting back whatever insult or sharp retort he'd doubtless had in mind, he stepped past the younger man and reached out, placing one palm flat against a particular rune.

Stiles didn't _see_ anything still, but he _felt_ it. A rushing sweep of something – power, old power, power he didn't know the nature or origin of. Automatically he went through everything he knew about what he _could_ see: the cypress, often regarded as a symbol of death and rebirth, an old, old tree with old, old runes that reacted to Derek's touch... There was something pack-related here, obviously, since the Hales had inhabited this area since before it was Beacon Hills, before the land had become a nature reserve. But more than that, he couldn't tell.

Until he heard Derek make a small sound, saw him drag an extended claw across his palm deep enough to draw blood, and watched him smear it across the cypress' bark.

The power wasn't just a rush beneath the skin or a hum below the edge of the senses then. It was like an oversized fist smashing into him, all but knocking him back even though it lacked a physical form. It eddied and swirled around him, around _both_ of them, until the air was full of shapes, half-transparent figures formed of a cool grey mist.

Stiles didn't believe in ghosts. He had no reason to; they weren't possible. But _this_? This was _sure as hell_ something beyond the realm of the living.

“Derek?” For the first time in a long time, he sounded scared. “What the hell are they?”

“Munin,” the alpha said, repeating what Deaton had said at the clinic. “They are the munin. And if you can see them, feel them...” He let out a bark of a laugh, rough and humorless. “We have a big problem.”

 

~

 

Explanations came later, once the grove and its ghost mob had been left behind and Stiles was safely settled in the living room of the rebuilt Hale house, but they didn't help him look any less shell-shocked. “The spirits of the dead,” he repeated a touch incredulously, looking up at Derek. “You have ghosts of your former pack floating around.”

“Not ghosts,” the werewolf sighed, sounding annoyed. “More like... memories. Their souls, their power, remain with the pack, so long as they are returned to the pack's ground when they die. My family would never become munin,” he added bitterly, obviously using it as a way of explanation, but still not liking to talk about the fire that had cost him just about everyone he knew and loved. The guilt still hung heavy on him, even years after the initial incident. “Laura is – should be – among them, but it's hard to tell. They're just shapeless forms to most of us, lending power when we call on them, more of just a... tradition, I guess, than anything practical.”

“What happened earlier sure as hell didn't feel like _lending power_.” It had felt more like... not possession, exactly. Again, not possible. Well, not with the spirits of the dead. Demons, maybe, but Stiles had never had to deal with them, and hoped he never did. What had happened had been more like an awakening of some instinct he knew for a fact he didn't have, like someone had slid under his skin and pushed him towards an option he hadn't known existed. Not forcing, exactly, but... coaxing him down the path of least resistance. Clouding his mind a little so his own common sense didn't take over too quick.

“No.” Derek had been pacing, but now he stopped, giving Stiles a bleak look. “You understand that to call the munin, when you aren't part of the pack, is impossible.”

“Yeah, I think you've said that.”

“But you did.” He studied the other like he was looking for something, some mark, some new rune, some _something_ that would have caused it. But Stiles hadn't done it on purpose, and he still wasn't sure what, exactly, he'd done. If what Derek had done earlier had been 'calling the munin,' that wasn't at all what he'd experienced. By the way the other said it, though, it wasn't exactly what he meant.

Derek sighed. “There have always been, in every couple of generations, people who had an inclination towards spirit magic. Who could sort of communicate with the munin, not just pull on their power like the rest of the pack, but who could channel the talents or the knowledge of individuals. There hadn't been anyone for years, though. There shouldn't have been anyone else, not with the pack we have now.” The ragtag group of barely-legal teens, he meant. Not Hales. Not the all-powerful born werewolf line, but the ones who had been bitten. Stiles got it, he really did.

Which meant his little brush with the munin was weirder and weirder.

“Okay.” Leaning back in his seat Stiles furrowed his brows, tapping fingertips restlessly against his knee. “So I _somehow_ , and let's not get into the how right now because I really don't know, managed to, what, call down some spirit of your pack's ancestors? Someone who could – what did Deaton call it – _call flesh_ , or what the hell ever?” The werewolf nodded, and he let out a faint mirthless laugh of his own. “Great. Awesome. So your ghost pack didn't think my way of healing was good enough, I had to _grope_ you better. Fantastic.” He tilted his chair back onto two legs, glaring at the ceiling. “What do I do with that now?”

“Nothing.” Derek's voice was hard, and he pulled the other back upright, the legs of the chair clattering loudly against the hardwood flooring. “If you know what's good for you, you'll find out what the cause was, and never let it happen again.”

Stiles rolled his eyes, but he held his tongue. That was what he was planning on doing, anyway. “Yeah, whatever, o fearless leader. You gonna let me get some sleep now?” He had no time to get home, but he could at least get a few hours' shut-eye on the couch before he had to get in for a shift at work. No rest for the weary, apparently.

The alpha waved him off, but not before shooting one last warning his way. “I'm serious, Stiles – not every ancestor of the pack was good. Messing with the dead... it's dangerous.” His voice held a low edge of actual concern, which Stiles might have been flattered by, if he weren't so goddamn exhausted. Instead of accepting it for what it was, he just flashed a tired smirk, lifting a hand in a mock salute. “Don't worry, wolf-boy. I'm more than willing to let the past stay in the past, and the dead stay dead.”

If only.


	3. Chapter Three

The dead, as it turned out, really, _really_ didn't want to stay dead.

It wasn't just the whole munin fiasco. Maybe it was just the season, but suddenly they were facing a influx of dead, half-dead, and undead creatures dragging their way out of their graves to be complete and total pains in the ass. Stiles was never going to be able to enjoy Halloween again after having to mow down a couple dozen zombies (yes, brain-eating, shuffling, half-rotted _zombies_ , and it was _so_ much less cool than the movies would suggest), and half the pack was going to carry scars from trying to fight off wraiths before they'd figured out how to properly put them back in the ground. Werewolf healing couldn't fix everything, and neither could Stiles.

Though he tried. And maybe it was the healing, maybe it was the sudden mob of undead, but the munin reared their ugly heads yet again.

Like, a _lot_.

The first time, when Scott got gashed up by a wight, it made sense to get close. Stiles did have a tendency to go a little crazy on the protective instinct with _all_ of the wolves, but his best friend especially. It didn't take him long to figure out that, in this case, getting too close was a really really _bad_ idea – the fact that he was suddenly seeing the goofy dumbass kid he'd grown up with as if through a soft-filtered lens, actually finding Scott McCall of all people _attractive_ , made it very obvious. Trouble was, it wasn't easy to pull away. Not when there was a hunger rising in his gut, a hunger that had nothing to do with food.

He got knocked back ten feet by another wight before he could actually _do_ anything, but the feeling remained. And it just made it worse the next time.

Scott had gotten off with nothing more than a weird look; Isaac wasn't so lucky, ending up sprawled out face-down on the ground with Stiles' weight on him, making odd keening noises that weren't quite pain when blunt human teeth bit at the back of his neck. The wounds got healed that time, at least, but not before Stiles had dragged his nails over the open edges of the cuts, had all but covered his hands in the beta's blood. The imprint of his teeth stayed on the nape of Isaac's neck for a day and a half, not remotely normal for a wound made by a human.

And then there was the banshee fiasco.

Stiles couldn't even _remember_ half of what happened that night, but he sure as hell remembered ending up on top of Erica, one hand halfway down her shirt, pressed against her rapidly beating heart. He could feel it thrumming against his palm, almost more than he could feel the smooth warmth of her skin, the swell of her breast where his fingers pressed against it. Practically groping the girl, and all he could focus on was her beating heart – and how easy it would be to make it beat faster, to dig his fingers through the flesh until he held her heart in his hands in truth, so he could feel her fear making it pound like a drum.

She almost took out an eye with her claws when she hit him, and Stiles didn't blame her. Because that shit? Not even _remotely_ acceptable.

Derek had to haul her away from him by the scruff of her neck like a pup, and the entirety of the pack was watching him like he was something to be afraid of. There were flickers of anger in some eyes, revulsion in others. And the alpha was looking at him with his lips set in a tense, furious line, like this was somehow Stiles' fault, like he was voluntarily _choosing_ to go all psycho-serial-molester on them.

He sat there, bleeding and pretty sure he had a concussion, a little bit concerned about what would happen if he tried to heal himself. But mostly he just felt angry in return – a vast, cold anger at being blamed, at being looked at like a freak. The kind of anger that tried to mask how freaking terrified he was of what he was doing.

When he finally spoke, breaking the tense silence, the words were quiet, hoarse, and not ones anyone would ever expect to hear from Stiles:

“I need to talk to Peter.”

 

~

 

Derek's uncle hadn't stuck around any longer than he needed to, which made sense, since a full half of the pack or the people close to it hated him, he was still technically a dead man as far as Beacon Hills was concerned, and, in his own words, he didn't need to waste his time with a bunch of teenagers. Oh, he still popped up and again at the odd moment, and Stiles was still sure he was up to something, but he wasn't part of the pack. Not really.

It took long enough for Derek to get in touch with him and bring him into town that the claw marks across Stiles' face had healed from the angry red scabs they'd been, leaving paler pink marks to remind him. He'd heal the scars eventually, assuming he could keep control of himself for that long and figure out how to make his healing runes _useful_ again. Right now, every time he tried to trigger them, it just seemed like he brought on more trouble.

The older wolf regarded him with his usual supercilious amusement while Derek explained what had been going on, a task Stiles had given over to him only because he could make it a hell of a lot more concise than Stiles himself would have. He saw Peter's lips twitch slightly at the mention of the munin, like a silent laugh, which was not at all reassuring; the only reason he'd called on the smug bastard for help was because he'd be better versed in pack lore than either Derek or Deaton. He might know something about how to keep the munin from swarming into Stiles' brain.

When Derek ended the brusque recounting of events with a terse, “Can you help us stop it?”, though, Peter just raised his shoulders in a casual shrug. “Stop it? The munin can't be kept out. Those with the talent to call them either live with it, or go insane.” Oh, _that_ was reassuring. Stiles had stepped forward without even thinking about it, hands balled tightly into fists at his sides. Not a smart move, even if these days, with his magic, he could probably take on a werewolf. Peter just raised his hands, palm-out, hiding another smirk. “You _can_ , however, learn to control it. Assuming you have the discipline.”

“I think I can manage,” Stiles snapped back, voice tight and angry. He'd controlled a hell of a lot more with a hell of a lot less at stake.

The man gave him that look again, like he'd done something funny, then gestured, languid. “Go on, then. Call the munin.” When Stiles and Derek both just stared at him like he'd grown a second head, Peter did laugh, shifting slightly in the chair he'd claimed as his own. “Did you think you'd be able to control them without having them around? That's a little overly ambitious even for you, Stiles.”

He shifted, uncomfortable, eyes falling from Peter, then flicking to Derek. “... I don't _call_ them,” he said finally, gritting his teeth. “They just come when somebody's hurt. When I go to help them.”

“Ah.” That was it, one single eloquent syllable, and then Peter was moving like a blur, one clawed hand ripping up Derek's torso from navel to collarbone, biting in deep enough that the thick smell of blood was instantaneous. The alpha fell back, hands pressed to his stomach like he was trying to keep his internal organs from becoming unfortunately external, and Peter raised a brow. “You did ask for my help.”

Cursing, Stiles shot one more venomous, 'I-will-murder-you-one-day-you-psychotic-fuck' sort of glare at the older wolf, then went to his knees beside Derek.

The wounds were even worse up close. Peter had shredded through the softer flesh of Derek's stomach, and Stiles could catch glimpses of things that made bile rise up in the back of his throat. Even running with the pack, he'd never had to get this up-close-and-personal with somebody's intestines. It wasn't pretty, and did not inspire the least urge in him to get any closer, to touch. Of course, he hadn't called on the healing runes yet, either – that seemed to be what was triggering the munin, for the most part. It wasn't until he laid hands on someone to help them heal that he got blindsided with creepy, touchy urges.

So he bit back the urge to gag and pressed his hands over where Derek himself was clutching at the open wounds, eyes closing for a moment and mouth forming silent words in lost languages. Some people could work spells with as little as a thought; Stiles still kind of had to work at it, but at least he had the symbols on his skin to draw on. Extra boosts of power and the ability to be prepared for almost anything for a little more effort – he thought it was a fair trade, given that it made him basically magic Batman. Right now, though, he would have given a lot to be able to work _faster_.

Not that he thought Derek was going to die. Not that he thought Peter would actually hurt him enough to kill him. But the smell of blood was thick enough to choke on, and he could feel the raggedly severed edges of flesh under his fingers. It wasn't pretty, and it sure as hell wasn't something he wanted to have to cope with for long.

Stiles put that selfish urgency into the press of power, pushed it rushing through his veins and out of his skin, through his palms where they pressed against Derek's flesh. He was touching bare skin, he realized, hands sliding into the gaps where claws had shredded fabric as well as tissue and muscle. Bare skin and exposed muscle and blood – and all of a sudden he could feel it on him, the rush of heat that seeped into his very bones, that made him start forward, pushing a little harder than he'd intended against the other's stomach.

Derek made a pained sound, and he _liked_ it. He wanted to draw out more like it, to see exactly what it took to push the big, bad alpha to the breaking point, to where he'd beg for relief. He wanted to see just how much he could endure.

Much as he had with Isaac, he pushed his fingers into the wounds, keeping them open, keeping them from knitting up again. The werewolf had already started to heal a little, but his flesh was still raw and bleeding; Stiles could feel the muscles of his stomach twitching, trying to mend around his hands. He laughed, and it was low, throaty, nothing like his own. Derek was looking at him like he'd grown a second head, but he didn't care in the least.

He crawled over the other, dragging his hands slowly up the length of the wounds. He could practically hook his fingertips under the other's collarbone, the claw marks were so deep, and he laughed again at the discovery, fingers grating against bone. Part of him recoiled at that; it wasn't very human. Hell, enjoying something like that wasn't very _sane_. But at the moment, Stiles wasn't sure he – or whatever it was in his head – was either of those things.

Derek seemed to be healing a little more slowly now, whether because of Stiles' hands in the open gashes or simply because he was so hyper-focused that it only _felt_ slower. But no – he could hear the alpha's heartbeat, swift and frantic. His eyes shifted to where his pulse pounded against his throat, and Stiles didn't have the time to stop himself this time; he lowered his mouth to it, licking a few droplets of blood spatter from the warm skin before latching onto that frenzied beat.

He didn't bite down, but he sucked hard enough that he would end up leaving the beginnings of a pretty epic hickey, assuming Derek didn't heal it the instant he pulled away. Though given how long his teeth marks had stayed on Isaac's neck... the thought almost made him _want_ to bite, a perverse need to mark making itself known. That, Stiles managed to steer away from, though only with great force of will. The thing in his head thought that it would be amusing, to leave evidence behind. No one would ever think it was from _healing_ , that was for damn sure.

Because he wouldn't let it bite, it pursued other urges, and his hands slid back down Derek's torso, this time away from the wounds. He found himself admiring the feel of muscle under his palms, and yeah, it wasn't like he hadn't noticed before that the alpha was freaking _ripped_ , but he'd never exactly felt an urge to run his hands over his stomach. Or to drop his head and lick his way along the smooth sculpted lines. Stiles' admiration had always been more of a distant, once-you-see-it-you-can't-help-but-be-impressed sort; this was a lot more _hands-on_.

Hands on, mouth on... whatever was most convenient, really.

He had dropped a few inches to lap at the blood pooling on the werewolf's chest like a cat with cream, without even realizing he'd done it. Choking a little on the bitter metallic taste once he thought too hard, he forced himself back up, forced himself to look at the injuries, not the skin surrounding. Healing, he was supposed to be _healing_ Derek – but making him hurt, making him work for it, seemed to be a far more entertaining prospect.

The other had been making more of those sounds, quiet and almost helpless, and Stiles could see he'd shut his eyes, turned his head away, like he was trying not to focus. A low growl trickled from his lips at the realization, and it wasn't the muffled sound of frustration he usually made. It sounded like it was pulled from low in his throat, from a register of his voice he wasn't even sure he _had_ , quiet and dangerous and very much not human.

Derek's eyes snapped open at that, and this time Stiles held them, his own gaze dark, demanding the alpha's attention remain on him. His hands left the other's skin, planting themselves on the floor, but he didn't need them to keep contact. He pressed himself up against the alpha, hip to hip, body rolling against Derek's with a sinuous grace he hadn't known he was capable of, and was rewarded with another low grunt of pain. Or was that something else? He pushed his hips a little more snugly up against the werewolf's, and smirked to feel him half-hard, the already tight denim of his jeans made tighter still.

“All this effort, Derek, all this pretense, just to pretend you don't enjoy it? That's an awful lot of effort,” he murmured into the other's ear, sounding low and sultry and deadly and not at all like himself. Stiles was a lot of things, but most of them were blunt force, sarcasm, sharp clever words spoken too fast so he didn't feel like he was losing grip on the situation. This was far more insinuating, and the delivery – it was straight out of a high-quality porno, like a caress with words alone. He sounded like someone with a hell of a lot more experience than he actually possessed; someone who had picked up the voice through using it, not simply practicing and mimicking what he'd heard.

It was kind of terrifying, actually, even to his own ears. To judge by the way Derek's eyes widened, it was even scarier to him.

And god help him, he liked knowing _that_ , too.

The part of him that was still purely _him_ was starting to freak, swimming to the surface over the unfamiliar instinct he'd been acting on. Healing, he still needed to do that, even though he didn't think Derek was actually bleeding anymore, and the tears in his skin were a lot shallower than they had been. It didn't matter. At this particular moment, he'd have tried to heal a mosquito bite if he had thought it would get this _thing_ out of his head. Trying to find the control, the discipline he'd claimed he possessed, he locked onto the thought of the wounds, the thought of mending them.

He pushed down with his body, not his hands, but the power still boiled up through his skin, spilling over into Derek's. Bare skin would have been better, something whispered, and he knew it was the truth, but it was too late for that right now. The claw marks were closing, smoothing out like wet clay being carefully molded back into shape. He jerked his hips against Derek's, and his breath caught in a rush; he _wanted_ to pull the remnants of the other's shirt from his chest, wanted to replace the claw marks with nail marks of his own, but a hand closed on his shoulder, distracting him.

He'd forgotten Peter was there, and the moment the older wolf touched him, he was seeing things he _knew_ weren't from his mind, things he hadn't ever particularly wanted to see. A younger Peter Hale sprawled out against bright red sheets, head thrown back, panting, laughing – he still had that knowing, smug look in his eyes, but there was something missing, some shadow lifted from him. Before the fire, then. Peter as he had been once.

He _felt_ the vivid memory of running hands over skin, of a body melding against Peter's, but it couldn't have been his, because there were things in that memory that Stiles definitely lacked, soft curves, carefully manicured crimson nails, a long fall of auburn hair. It made him jerk back, away from Peter, toppling over onto his side on the bloodstained floor. Fear, no, _panic_ , came back in a rush, and he stared at Peter, horrified and admittedly a little grossed out.

It was sad when a sensory flashback to the one-time alpha's sex life was the least weird thing that had happened in the last few minutes.

The rush of power had receded to a buzz in the back of his head, fading slowly until Stiles was completely himself again. He didn't vomit up the blood this time, to his credit, but he definitely considered it as an option. It was thick on the back of his tongue, in his throat, but the fear of what the hell he had done, what the hell was happening to him, was a little more pressing.

Derek looked about as freaked as he felt. Peter, on the other hand, looked pleased and ever-so-slightly... ew, was he _turned on_ by that little show? Or was it the memory? He'd felt it as much as Stiles had, he knew instinctively, had relived those brief few moments. That sort of made him want to throw up more than the blood did.

“Raina,” he said after a long moment, the name rich on his tongue like a fond memory. The smirk on his lips widened to a grin, and he laughed, head thrown back, almost like he had in the flashback; it brought a shudder down Stiles' spine, against his will. “You always manage to surprise me, Stiles, even when you don't intend to.” Something about the way he said that didn't sound good.

His eyes flickered to Derek again, the blood on his skin, the mark on his neck, and – he couldn't _not_ look – the slightly diminished but still noticeable bulge in his jeans.

Yeah. This was not good at all.

 


	4. Chapter Four

“So every time I heal one of the pack, I'm going to try to fuck them.” Stiles paused for a moment, lips pressed together into a tight, angry line. “... that's not going to go over well.”

They had been quiet for a long time after Peter left them to the uncomfortable tension and the blood-splattered floorboards. Derek looked like he was trying to pull himself together again; he'd gone and changed into some clothes that were neither shredded nor stained, and Stiles sort of wished he had the same luxury. He had washed the blood off his hands and face, but he could still smell it on his clothes, his skin. Taking a shower here wasn't exactly an option, since he'd just have to get back into the same bloodied mess afterwards. Besides, he didn't want to know what would happen if the munin kicked up again while he was naked and more able to make _really bad choices_.

Not that it should. According to Peter, once the munin had passed through, they usually didn't come again unless called, and Stiles was sure as hell not trying to call that thing again. From what the older wolf had told them about Raina, he was pretty positive he didn't want her in his head.

Though he didn't have much choice in the matter. He could theoretically call any of the munin, Peter had told him, but the runes that had converged to cause the problem in the first place made it far easier for Raina to come to his call than any other. Besides, she had evidently been a pushy bitch even in life; death hadn't really changed that. Simply swirling around in an endless circle, waiting to be called on, didn't suit her idea of an afterlife. She wanted out to play, and her idea of fun... well, it wasn't what Stiles would call a good time.

He thought Derek would agree with that. The other looked at him with a closed-off expression, though, hiding whatever he felt (most likely fear, revulsion, disgust, horror, terror – any of the above). “No.” Gee, wasn't _that_ the understatement of the year. Stiles rolled his eyes, tilting his head back against the back of the couch. At least they'd been smart enough to move into another room, one that didn't have blood puddles on the floor that made him want to run screaming.

He wondered if the stain was ever going to come out of the floorboards. He wondered if Derek _cared_.

“So what the hell am I supposed to do? Hope nobody gets hurt enough to need my help? Let them die so I don't freak them the fuck out?” Stiles' words were sharp and bitter, clearly unhappy with the situation. There had to be a third option, something besides refusing to heal or dealing with the consequences of the munin. He could learn to control them, but even that wasn't going to simply let him shut things away and not have to deal with them. Not according to Peter, anyway.

Controlling the munin evidently meant not fighting them. Fighting allowed them to take greater control over them; if he just allowed them to move through them, he could call on their power and retain control of his own actions a little more. That still meant letting a crazy sadistic nymphomaniac color his decisions, though, and Stiles was just _not_ okay with that. Not even a little.

Derek was silent for a long moment, though he didn't really blame the guy. It had been a hypothetical question, not one he expected the alpha to suddenly have all the answers to. It didn't make him any less frustrated. Still, when the other did start to speak, he raised his head to shoot him a wary glare, automatically assuming he wouldn't like anything the alpha had to say.

Not unexpectedly, he was right. “You need someone who can redirect the munin's attention,” he said quietly, voice tight and deliberately toneless. “Someone who won't take exception to it.”

“Right, so next time I manage to snag a girlfriend, I'll be sure to bring her out on pack business so I can grope her in company in order to keep from being completely useless,” he snapped in response, enough anger in his voice that it made Derek almost wince. “ _That_ sounds like a good idea.”

“That's not what I meant.” He had been pacing, but he drew to a stop now, looking down at Stiles. He had that 'serious-thinking' expression of his on, eyebrows drawn down into a tense frown, slight lines of tension at the corners of his eyes and mouth. “You need someone who can take the damage Raina is going to want to dish out. I wouldn't advise bringing someone human into that.”

Now he was sitting up to glare directly into Derek's face, spine and shoulders tense, fingers digging into the couch's upholstery. “So, what? I go start scouring the supernatural dating world? Because let's be honest, buddy, I don't see _you_ volunteering.” He had meant it as a gibe, because there was no way in hell Derek could want to voluntarily subject himself to _that_ again. He'd endured the munin working through Stiles twice already; a third time, and he wouldn't be all that surprised if the alpha just put him out of his misery.

What he did not expect was for Derek's expression to tense a little more, and then for him to give a slow nod. “It's my pack. It's my job to protect them.”

Stiles gaped at him for a moment before the anger came rushing in again, scalding hot and sudden. Jaw set in a hard line, he let out a sharp, dry laugh. “Right. Glad you're self-sacrificing enough to take on such an unpleasant _duty_ ,” he snapped, pushing himself to his feet. “Don't worry. You won't have to subject your _virtue_ to the munin again. I'll just--” He cut off with a frustrated sound, because honestly, he didn't know what he was going to do. Hide from the problem, maybe, just stop healing until he found some way to completely banish the munin. Maybe getting rid of the runes would do it, or...

“ _Stiles_.” Derek's voice was hard, that particular frustrated tone he only got when he was at the end of his rope, out of patience. Not surprisingly, Stiles tended to be the one who heard it most. “Just think about it. I can take any damage Raina wants you to dish out, and I'm not... attached, so there's not going to be any issue. Don't get all offended; it's not like it's actually _you_.” He sounded exasperated, and that wasn't making his attempt to explain his rationalization without sounding like a jackass any easier.

And Stiles had kind of had it with the werewolf's jackassery. Yeah, Derek had just as much reason to be freaked as he did, but – god, didn't he _get_ it? It _was_ him. It was his mind being overrun by sadistic sexual urges, his body acting on them. It didn't matter that the munin was the driving force. Stiles was the one dealing with the aftermath.

“You know what? Go fuck yourself, how about that? Then the munin won't need to do a goddamn thing,” he hissed through gritted teeth, pushing his way past Derek with a not-accidental shove of his shoulder. Even that bit of physical proximity sent a spike of remembrance through him that was the munin's doing – again, _her_ doing, but _his_ memory had to cope with it. Freaking _great_.

“Stiles,” Derek started again, but the younger man whipped back around with a vicious glare, a trickle of the dangerous growl he'd uttered earlier escaping him. “Don't, Derek. Just _don't_.”

Then he was out the door, slamming it behind him with enough force to make the wood rattle.

 

~

 

Avoidance had never been Stiles' preferred strategy for dealing with most problems, but for certain kinds of _really messed-up shit_ , he would make an exception. This was one. Of course, just like every other time, it was very quickly made clear to him that he couldn't avoid something forever. And just like every other time, it was a vividly unpleasant reminder. Like trying to ignore his mom's sickness until he found out she was dying.

This time, it was Boyd who was dying.

It was standard wolfsbane poisoning, but someone had made a nasty little concoction that had a time release, that didn't show up in the system until after the original wound had already closed. They had brought him to Deaton's, but the vet couldn't do anything for him. Stiles had been keeping his distance from the pack since his last run-in with the munin; he had only come because Scott had sounded desperate.

It wasn't for Derek. He sure as hell wouldn't have come if the alpha had tried to bring him. But the others were still _his pack_ , which meant that letting one of them bite it? Not an option.

The Jeep's brakes squealed as he pulled up into the parking lot, practically throwing himself out of the vehicle before he'd taken his keys out of the ignition. He barreled into the back room where Boyd was laid out on one of the examining tables, looking like – well, to say _utter shit_ would be an understatement, actually.

He was bleeding from his nose, ears, eyes... it looked like the blood was seeping out anywhere it could, black and foul-smelling. His dark skin had an ashen cast, and the pained sounds he was making were so far from human it wasn't even funny. Erica was clinging to his hand, and she gave Stiles a desperate look the moment he came in.

God. He'd managed to ignore the fact that the pack might just need him while no one had been getting hurt, but he couldn't leave Boyd like that. Even if it meant dealing with the munin.

Dropping the bag of supplies he'd brought – he had to assume that Deaton had tried everything that herblore or common spells could do, anyway – he approached the wounded beta. “Hey, man, it's going to be all right, okay? Just trust me.” Boyd's eyes were bloody, but he still managed to look Stiles in the face, still managed to lift his head off the table enough to give a small nod. The big guy always had been the strongest of the betas, though that didn't seem to be helping him much now.

Sucking in a deep breath, he waved Erica away and stepped closer. This was going to be messy, in more ways than one.

Looking at Boyd from this close, it was clear that even if he thought he could have used his usual healing runes without triggering the munin, they wouldn't have been worth much. Hell, he wasn't even sure the munin could heal this much internal damage. But he had to try.

It was hard to try and call on Raina's particular brand of crazy when the beta looked so pitiful, though. The last few times, he'd been driven by instinct, just trying to heal when the munin had taken over, but that had been when he hadn't known quite what he was dealing with. Now that he was aware of what he was doing, it was... more difficult.

No, those weren't the words he was looking for. _Freaking impossible_ was more like it.

A warm touch at the back of his neck startled him into looking up, away from Boyd. Derek; how had he _known_ it was Derek? He attempted to shake the hand off, but the alpha's grip tightened just slightly on the nape of his neck, and he shook his head, expression set and as emotionless as he could make it. “You know what the munin is drawn to. Use it.” His hand traced down Stiles' spine, and the younger man gritted his teeth and did not pull away, turning his attention back to Boyd.

There was no wound to focus on; the beta's entire _body_ was the wound. So Stiles just set his palms against the other's chest and screwed his eyes tightly shut, swallowing down his own unease and fear and tugging on his healing runes. At the same time he was casting about, desperate, one thought running through his mind: _Come on, you crazy bitch. I need your help._

Raina crashed into him like an anvil, and for the first time, Stiles was grateful for it.

Distantly he could feel Derek grabbing at the back of his shirt so he didn't collapse forward onto Boyd, since as much as the other was suffering at the moment, the additional pressure could only make him hurt worse. Not that the munin riding him would have minded; Raina liked pain, enjoyed inflicting it. She had seen wolves in worse states than this recover without a scratch to show for it, though the scars left on their minds were another matter.

That was reassuring, he guessed, but only if she was willing to help heal him now.

He tried to pull on that power he had come to expect from the munin, to shove all that potential energy into Boyd, but Raina balked. She would choose this particular moment to demand a fee for her aid, when the beta was dying in front of her. Stiles let out a frustrated growl, but it sounded like him, not like Raina.

Derek's fingers curled in the back of his shirt and he _shook_ him, honest-to-god, an action that caught both his and the munin's attention. Then his mouth was pressed against Stiles' ear, the sharp points of fangs just barely scraping the skin. “ _Don't fight it_.” His words were a caution, logically he knew that, but Raina took them as a challenge.

This time when he snarled, it was a low, hair-raising, spine-tingling rumble from deep in his chest. Derek yanked his head back and _kissed_ him, hard enough to cut off the sound, tongue pressing into his mouth, fangs nicking his lip and spilling a faint taste of copper onto his tongue.

Under normal circumstances – well, this never would have _happened_ under normal circumstances, and if it had, Stiles would have instantly been on the alert for mind-control spells, compulsions, or some other behavior-altering magic. Now, though, he kissed back like it was a fight, struggling for dominance, attention entirely diverted from Boyd. His hands tugged Derek close, blunt nails digging into his back through the fabric of his shirt, pressing hard enough to do damage even in the absence of claws. He would have preferred to be able to sprout talons and shred through flesh, but he'd take what he could get.

The alpha gave back as good as he got, pushing into Stiles until his back hit the cool metal of the examining table. Boyd made another pained sound at that, but it barely registered in his mind; evidently it did in Derek's, though, because the other was growling into his mouth, hauling him around to look at the beta again. “Heal him,” he grated into Stiles' ear, pressing up against his back; that low, rich laugh that was definitely Raina's left the younger man's mouth. “Are you planning on _making_ me?” He slipped a hand behind him, deftly finding the werewolf's crotch despite the fact that _Stiles_ had never attempted such a maneuver before, and by all rights should be awkward at it. Derek was pressed half-hard against his jeans, something the munin reveled in, taking a firmer grip on the denim-covered flesh to get him harder still.

He could feel the other's reaction to the touch – but he only allowed it to go on for a moment before he was twisting Stiles' arm up behind his back, keeping pressure on the joint. “I will if I have to.” He was still pressing himself against the other's body, though, hips pushed forward enough that he could grind into him just a little.

Another, longer laugh left him, and Stiles laid his free hand on Boyd's chest again and _pushed_.

The wolfsbane poisoning was pervasive, he could feel it like a maze of sickness running through the other's veins. The part of him not swamped by the munin found it weirdly fascinating, like a puzzle he had no chance of solving, but Raina didn't give a damn about the nature of the poison. All she cared about was burning it out, and getting her pint of blood and pound of flesh in reward.

It was almost like burning, power surging and searing the poison away. Boyd was screaming the entire time, and Stiles had never heard him lift his voice in pain like that before. The munin drank it in even as a hand slid up to stroke the other's brow, a mockery of a soothing gesture. It took time, time and pain, but the beta would heal. Maybe, if he was lucky, he'd even forget.

That was definitely a possibility, since the other was unconscious by the time he was finished chasing every last drop of poison from his blood. Only once that was finished, the beta's breathing and heartbeat steady, did he cautiously pull his arm free of Derek's grip. Stiles was swimming back into control a little, enough to keep himself from doing any unnecessary damage to Boyd, but there were still shades of Raina in the darkness of his eyes, the low insinuating tone of his voice. “He'll be fine. Are you planning on standing there all day, or... ?”

By the low growl the alpha gave him in return, he was a little too lacking in his own control to say no.

 

~

 

They barely made it out of the vet, Stiles managing to keep Raina's instincts at bay only for so long. Hell, they didn't even manage to make it out of the parking lot before he broke, whirling on Derek with a hungry look in his eyes. The alpha responded in kind; he pushed Stiles up against the side of the Camaro, mouth on his again, just as swift and domineering as before. One knee pressed between the younger man's legs, keeping him effectively pinned against the car. Not that Stiles was trying to get away.

 _He_ would have preferred a little privacy for this sort of thing, but Raina had no issue with exhibition. She was still very firmly in the driver's seat, because if she hadn't been, Stiles would never have been in this situation. Though that wasn't to say certain _parts_ of him weren't responding positively to the attention. He couldn't entirely blame that on the munin.

He could, however, blame _Derek_ , because the other was working a hand down the front of his jeans, wrapping a hand around his half-hard cock with no hesitation whatsoever, despite the public venue. Stiles bit at his mouth, arched into his touch, grinding shamelessly into the alpha's hand. No one was there to watch, so what point was there in being shy? Though admittedly, Raina almost would have found it more amusing _with_ an audience. She would content herself with being out in the open with the risk of being seen, though, unlikely as it was.

The werewolf slid his hand along him in a swift, sudden stroke, and Stiles broke the kiss, throwing his head back to moan, loud enough to draw attention if the mere sight of them groping against the side of the Camaro hadn't. Derek growled, free hand sliding into his hair, tugging him close again, though Stiles turned his head so his mouth didn't catch the other's, but skirted down the side of his neck, pressing over the heady beat of his pulse.

It didn't take long. Stiles could feel his own rapid heartbeat reflected in the speeding of Derek's pulse, and the other's hand worked faster over him, not giving him a moment to catch his breath. He might not be in high school anymore, but Stiles was still a teenager, albeit a legal one, and his training with Deaton and constant pack business hadn't left him a whole lot of time to experience much of _this_ from anyone other than his own hand. He came with a low, keening sound, and teeth dug into Derek's throat hard enough that he could taste blood, hard enough that he knew an imprint of the bite would be left behind.

Raina receded, slowly, reveling in the pleasure and the pain. That was a good thing – except for the fact that it left Stiles alone, still being pinned to a car by Derek Hale.

The other still had that hungry, fierce look on his face when Stiles finally managed to pull away enough to look at him, and when he leaned in, he would have sworn he was going to kiss him again, another harsh clash of lips, teeth, and tongues. Instead he tilted his head, and lips brushed carefully, almost chastely over the corner of Stiles' mouth.

Then he was pulling away, opening the driver's side door of the Camaro and sliding inside. He waited until Stiles was clear of the car to peel out of the parking lot, but he still just left him standing there, baffled, heart still thrumming against his chest, jeans half-undone and clinging stickily to his skin.

What in the hell had _that_ been?


	5. Chapter Five

Stiles' phone rang at four in the morning, Derek's number flashing across the screen. Groggily, he picked it up, hitting the 'Answer' button. “If someone's dying, can it wait until I've had more sleep?” His tone was slightly irritable, accompanied by a yawn into the phone. He was never really at his best when he was woken up out of a sound sleep, and he was still a little... weirded out about Derek, anyway. After that whole groping in the parking lot thing, he thought he had reason to be.

“Can you let me in?” The alpha sounded gruff and inscrutable, but that never meant anything. He always sounded like that. Rolling his eyes, Stiles went to the collection of talismans hanging off one corner of his bedframe that were linked to the wards around his house; keeping a circle of mountain ash around the property was just a little bit too much of a pain in the ass, so he'd come up with alternate methods of keeping himself safe. And his dad – since he was still living in the house with him, he had to make sure the guy was protected. Against _anything_ , not just werewolves.

Locating the correct talisman, he murmured the word that would unlock the wards to let Derek cross, then waited for the inevitable knock on his window. The werewolf seemed to be pretty much incapable of using the front door. Of course, given that the sheriff might have shot him on sight at this hour, that was probably reasonable.

The window slid open, and the alpha unfolded himself from the frame, stepping inside. Even in the dark, he didn't look like there was anything wrong with him, wasn't so much as blood-spattered or breathing hard, which meant there probably wasn't trouble. Stiles hadn't even bothered to get out of bed; he furrowed his brows at the other, obviously both confused and unhappy with his presence here. “And you're doing _what_ here at this godforsaken hour?”

In response, Derek just stalked towards him, that dark hungry look in his eyes again. Stiles didn't have a moment to protest before he was being pinned to the bed, the alpha's hands locking around his wrists, Derek's mouth hard on his--

“ _Stiles_!”

Scott's voice jarred him, and he pushed himself up from the couch he'd been half-dozing on, eyes wide and slightly bloodshot. “Jesus, _what_ , sorry, I'm awake, I...” Brows furrowing slightly, he shook his head, trying to assess his surroundings. Scott's, he was at Scott's, most of the pack sprawled out over various pieces of furniture, all of them looking at him strangely. The TV was blaring in the background. That was right, Scott had invited everyone over for movie night, Stiles had come only once the other had assured him that Derek wouldn't be there.

And, apparently, he'd dozed off and had a rather less than appropriate dream about the very person he was trying to avoid.

In front of the entire pack.

Yeah, _that_ was going to be difficult to explain.

It had been hard enough, explaining what had happened when he'd healed Boyd. All of them knew about the munin now, and some of them were at least a little grateful for it – Boyd himself maintained that he didn't care how it had happened, Stiles had saved his life. He was fine now, no trace of the wolfsbane poisoning left in his system, no sign of slipping back into the terrible state he'd been in before. The other's didn't seem to be quite so nonchalant about it, but at least they understood. At least they knew Stiles wasn't just going crazy on them.

He wasn't entirely convinced of that, actually. This wasn't the first dream he'd had about Derek, just the first one he'd had in company. By the way the rest of the betas were looking at him, they could smell the arousal on him; Stiles was mentally punching himself. _This_ was why he didn't sleep much lately.

Jackson was looking at him with narrowed eyes, suspicious. “Okay. What the hell, Stilinski?” He had been out of town for most of the crap with the munin, although he had been told about it as soon as he'd gotten back. Apparently, since he hadn't had to see it in action, he didn't know _quite_ how badly it affected Stiles. “Look, I know you're a weirdo, but moaning Derek's name in your sleep? Kind of takes the cake.”

Shit.

There wasn't any defense, since there were several witnesses there to confirm that he had, in fact, done just that. Stiles wasn't sure he wanted to give them the chance to. Instead he just cursed, running hands over his scalp in frustration of more than one kind. The annoyance and embarrassment of this happening with the betas around didn't quite deflate the fact that he was half-hard from the dream. “It's the fucking munin,” he snapped, though he wasn't entirely sure that was the truth. Admittedly, the dreams had all lacked the particular flair of sadism that tended to accompany Raina's presence in his head. “Its not like I can control it.

“I thought you were learning to.” That was Isaac, sounding slightly wary about speaking up, like Stiles would suddenly turn on him and snap at him. It was the same tone he still took with Derek sometimes; it was kind of unnerving, since Stiles had never really thought of himself as being that level of scary.

“It's not something I can just switch on and off,” he retorted irritably, pushing himself up off the couch (or rather, half-scrambling over the arm of it so his current state didn't become any more obvious to the pack). “Trying doesn't mean doing.” That had been especially true with the munin. No matter what he did, he couldn't seem to shut Raina out. He could keep her in check to a point, but she still always demanded her price.

The other spirits seemed to be a little more tractable, but they didn't come so easily to his call. And while they had a hell of a lot of fascinating things to tell him, they lacked the kind of raw power Raina had, especially when it came to healing.

“Sorry,” he muttered, still sounding more annoyed than anything. “It's late. I should go.” There was really no making a graceful exit here, but he could at least try.

Scott just frowned at him, looking slightly worried. “Yeah, okay. We'll, uh, see you.” Stiles nodded, slung his backpack over his shoulder from where it sat propped up against the side of the couch, and started for the door.

“... they ever going to get it together and fuck already?” He heard Erica's slightly amused query from behind him as he let himself out, followed by Scott's vehement denials and Jackson's gagging sounds of disgust. Shaking his head, he slammed the door a little louder than necessary just to prove he'd heard, and made for the Jeep.

Trouble was, she sort of had a point. The dreams seemed like a little less Raina, a little more a construct of his own mind, and Stiles wasn't sure how to feel about that. Yeah, it wasn't like there wasn't plenty of reason, considering the kind of excessively hot werewolf had literally jerked him off in a parking lot and then walked away. That left him with sort of a... lack of closure. _Lack of closure_ wasn't an explanation either, though, not for the intensity of the dreams, and the want that went along with them.

It wasn't like he hadn't thought about it before. Derek was basically a particularly surly male model, after all, with a tendency to walk around shirtless, and Stiles was... non-discriminating. There'd definitely been moments of attraction before, in the past, but he'd known there was no way in hell it was ever gonna happen. Derek was barely tolerant of him, most days. He relied on him, yeah, and his magic especially, but he didn't much _like_ him.

Not that Stiles had been aware of, anyway.

His actions, however, sort of begged to differ. If he had just been trying to trigger the munin, the whole encounter in the parking lot hadn't been necessary. Boyd had been healed, he hadn't needed to go any further. But he'd done it, and then afterwards...

That brief, careful kiss still confused him. It just didn't match up, not with anything Stiles was used to from the alpha. It sure as hell didn't make any sense with the situation they'd been in.

Maybe that was why his subconscious had been so fixated on the werewolf; he was trying to figure it out.

All he knew was that it was driving him up a wall, and Stiles was at his breaking point. Much though he didn't want to, he needed to talk to Derek. If only so the werewolf could tell him to fuck off and he could get some closure that way.

Sighing, he climbed into the driver's seat of his car and started towards the reserve and the Hale house. He had a feeling this wasn't going to be a pleasant conversation, a bone deep feeling that was based on instincts deeper than magic or munin. Avoiding things might have been easier, if he could have managed it. It really was a shame he was no longer terribly good at being a coward.

 

~

 

The house was dark when he got there, but that didn't mean anything, considering Derek had a penchant for lurking around in the dark. Stiles didn't bother pulling out his phone to try and call or text to check if the other was around. He just walked in, nudging the front door shut behind him. Even in the dark, he knew this place almost as well as his own house, which was a clear sign that he spent _way_ too much time here. He went automatically for the stairs, not trying to be quiet. If Derek was here, he'd hear him coming, anyway.

“You gonna come out, or just wait until I'm not expecting it so you can jump out and scare me?” He didn't bother raising his voice, either, just spoke normally. The door to the master bedroom, which Derek had taken as his own (when half the pack wasn't sleeping all together in a giant puppy pile, which happened more often than any of the betas liked to admit, since Stiles mocked them mercilessly for it), was closed, and he nudged it open, not being particularly cautious. “Because, you know, I'm really not in the mood for that.”

The flash of red eyes from across the room proved he wasn't alone. “You shouldn't be here.” Derek's voice was gruff, sharp, but Stiles wasn't letting it bother him this time. Snorting in irritation, he made his way towards the werewolf, clearly not caring what he said. “Well, you shouldn't be in my freaking _head_ , but clearly that's not the case.” The words were spoken in a huff, all the pent-up frustration of too many nights of really unfulfilling dreams audible in his voice.

A low snarl rose out of the darkness, and that made Stiles hesitate. Not because Derek was growling at him, that happened like, _constantly_ , but because there was something off about it. Some note of something unfamiliar, a strain in the werewolf's tone.

As usual, he barged ahead despite the growling werewolf, stopping short when he was close enough and his eyes had adjusted enough that he could actually _see_ Derek. The other was sprawled out, but not comfortably; one of his legs looked like it had been caught in something, bloody and so out of alignment it made Stiles wince to see it. There were other wounds higher up, ones that looked like bullet grazes, but those didn't concern him so much. Unless they were wolfsbane-laced, which would have put Derek in a lot more pain, they weren't much more than mosquito bites to the werewolf.

“God damn it, what did you do to yourself?” He stepped closer, making a face as he examined the wound, putting a hand on the other's knee to still him as he attempted to roll away. He shot a hard look up at Derek, expression both worried and incredulous. “Did you step in a fucking _bear trap_?”

“I was being shot at,” came the alpha's gruff retort, and Stiles let out a dry bark of a laugh. “Right, yeah, that makes it much better. Jesus, why didn't you call me? This looks like shit.” He touched a hand to the wound, all set and ready to call up some healing mojo, and Derek jerked away. That had to have hurt him more, but he pulled out of Stiles' grip, rolling to the opposite side of the mattress. “Don't.”

Brows furrowing, Stiles circled around the edge of the bed, planting himself firmly on the corner of the mattress. “Look, you need help. You let that heal by itself, and you're just going to need to break the leg again six or seven times to make sure all the shards are in the right places. That's going to hurt like hell, and I am _so_ not going to be the one doing the breaking when you start chickening out, even if you freaking paid me to.”

“I don't want you healing me.” Derek's voice was harsh and pained, but Stiles could hear that stubborn note the other took a lot of the time – hell, he knew it from his own voice. The frown darkened, and Stiles looked... well, offended sounded stupid, but yeah, he was kind of offended. What the hell had he done to make Derek doubt him?

Or maybe it wasn't about doubt. Maybe the other just didn't want Stiles touching him.

“I'm sorry I'm so un-fucking-bearably disgusting to you,” he snapped, angry now, heat rising in his voice. “Sure, if one of your pack were hurt you'd put yourself in the line of fire to make sure they got healed, but when it's just you and me, what, you're afraid I'll start jumping your bones if I touch you? Man up, Derek. You need healing, and I can do it.”

The werewolf was silent for a moment, and Stiles was hoping common sense had gotten through to him. Well, common sense and the hearty dose of _pissed off_ he had let be heard. But when the other spoke again, it was quieter, more pained, like the only reason he'd been silent at all was because he was too hurt to argue properly. “Not you.”

“ _What_?” Stiles genuinely didn't know what the hell his problem was. After all that shit in the parking lot at Deaton's, after the way he was fucking invading Stiles' dreams, he was still so--

“Not _you_ ,” Derek repeated, a little more firmly, putting the emphasis on the latter. Not a repetition; a clarification. It wasn't Stiles he was arguing so vehemently against. “Don't want the munin.”

Oh. Well.

That one mention, though, Stiles' anger and the smell of blood and Derek, were enough to bring her rushing into his head. He could feel Raina there, pushing to _make_ the alpha want her, want them, want what they could do, and for the first time in a long time, Stiles fought against her. He'd done what he had needed to, let her work through him without pushing back so she slipped away without demanding quite so heavy a price, but now... She was strong, and Stiles was pretty sure she was winning.

“Too bad,” he retorted with the low, throaty notes of suggestion that were all Raina, dropping to crawl up the mattress towards Derek in a way that should have been sensual, but kept ending up stilted because he was still fighting, and Stiles on his own was far from graceful. He ended up staring down at the werewolf, forcing himself to stop short of touching the other, but just barely.

Derek's expression wasn't one of fear, or revulsion. There was a hunger in his eyes, almost but not quite drowned out by the pain, the same hunger Stiles kept seeing in his dreams, kept replaying in his head. So that was why, he thought distantly, through the all-encompassing fog that was Raina. He didn't want the munin because he _did_ want it, because he was scared or freaked out by his own hunger for it. Kind of twisted, Stiles thought, and Raina liked that, locked onto it, making him lower his head that fraction of an inch more.

“You want it,” he breathed into Derek's ear, lips just barely brushing the flesh there, making the werewolf cringe away at the same time he tried to arch into the touch. “Oh, you do, I can smell it on you. Maybe that's why you keep getting yourself hurt, hm? You want _this_.” He slid a hand down the werewolf's side, pressing fingers into one of the healing gunshot wounds as he licked a hot line up the other's ear, bringing a sound that was half pain, half moan from Derek's lips. “No,” the alpha replied, and Stiles laughed, low and seductive. “Yes.”

“ _No_ ,” Derek repeated, jerking away, making another small pain sound as the movement jarred his shattered leg. There was a look on his face, something like fear despite the red eyes and the fangs that had slipped out. “... not _you_.”

It hit Stiles like a fist, but Raina was faster to understand what the other was getting at, and his shock gave her enough room to slide in, take control. He sat back on his heels, laughing, head thrown back, eyes almost tearing up with mirth. “Oh, gods. You want _him_ , don't you? You want him when I'm not there, and he thinks the only reason you'll touch him is to keep the pack safe from me.” Another laugh, low and smooth and rolling. Stiles' body was the one talking, moving, but it was all Raina; she was the one pushing him to lean back in, lips millimeters from Derek's. “But you can't have him without _me_ , and he won't have _you._ He doesn't want you,” she purred, lying so easily it sounded like truth. “So you'd better take advantage while you can, Derek. So long as I'm riding him, you can do what you want to him; you can pin him down and _fuck_ him like you so obviously want to, and he'll beg you for more.” She smirked with Stiles' lips, rolling hips down against Derek's. “It'll be better with me, I promise you that. You know what I can do,” she added, pressing a hand against his wound again, threading power into him even as she dug nails into his flesh, ripping the healing skin open once more.

Derek was growling again, but he was also arching up into the touch, the pressure of a body against his. Raina was overconfident, so certain her persuasions would win him; when he moved, sharply shoving the other away, it came as enough of a shock to put Stiles back in control.

It wasn't like she had just been able to push him out of his own mind. He could feel, see, hear what she was doing; probably the reason he looked more than a little ill at ease when he ended up flat on his back on the floor, breath knocked out of him. Derek was curled on the corner of the bed, panting, eyes wild, almost grey with the pain the effort had caused. “Get out of here, Stiles,” he growled, voice harsh, that commanding alpha voice. He was still hurt, though, and Stiles pushed himself up, worry knitting his brow, starting forward. “Derek-- “

“ _Go_!” It was a roar, and Stiles might not have been one of the other's betas, not part of the pack in truth, but he knew an order when he heard one. Shaken, confused, and more than a little bit freaked out, Stiles obeyed, turning tail and all but running back down the stairs, out of the Hale house. He didn't stop until he was back in the Jeep, heartbeat pounding too fast and too hard against his chest, hands shaking ever so slightly.

God damn it. He guessed he'd gotten the answer he had come for, but...

Jesus. Things just got more and more complicated.


	6. Chapter Six

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ack! So sorry this has taken so long to update. For my readers still following: I love you and I promise there's more to come!

If Stiles thought he couldn't sleep before, it was even worse now.

He was on shift at the restaurant he worked part-time at, dragging thanks to the fact that he had been subsisting solely on caffeine for the last week or so. He was mis-writing orders, dropping things, and he looked like hell – dark circles under his eyes, skin pale, posture slumped and exhausted. The rest of the staff and his customers were shooting him worried looks, but it was Lydia who pulled him aside after no more than an hour. She worked at the same restaurant as a hostess; she'd been the one to get him the job in the first place, actually, which meant she had reason to be concerned about his current poor performance. Not that she wouldn't worry about him anyway; ever since Stiles had gotten over his years-old crush on her, they'd actually been pretty decent friends, though he kept her out of the pack crap as much as he could manage. It was kind of an unspoken agreement amongst the pack – Jackson would murder them all if they got her involved, after all.

“Are you dying or something?” The redhead was tart as usual, though he could see the concern in her eyes. “Seriously, Stiles, you look awful.” She touched his shoulder gently, drawing his attention to her. “You shouldn't be trying to work like this.” By the looks a few of the other waiters were casting him, they thought the same way, although they were a bit less charitable about it.

Stiles shook his head, but there was barely any energy to the motion. “I'm fine.” Lydia gave him a hard look. “You're not.” Raising her voice, she spoke up, words clearly not directed at him. “I'm taking Stiles home, I don't think it's a good idea to let him drive. I'll find someone to cover both our shifts, don't worry.” She wasn't asking, and no one was arguing with the authoritative tone in her voice, least of all Stiles. He didn't even have time to, since she was steering him towards the door, barely giving him time to tug off his apron and set down his order pad.

She practically dragged him out to her car, but didn't start the engine once he had gotten into the passenger seat, sinking into the plush leather like he would fall asleep then and there. Instead she turned to stare at him, gaze sharp and knowing as ever. “Talk.” Another demand, though this one Stiles was less inclined to simply obey. She frowned at him, slight creases appearing between her brows, and elaborated: “I _know_ there's something going on. I haven't seen you look this out of it since... well, since you were hung up on me.” She sounded faintly embarrassed to bring it up, but that didn't stop her from saying it.

Nice to know his pining had been noticed, even if it was _way_ after the fact.

“ _Talk_ ,” she repeated, and Stiles sighed, shaking his head. “It's stupid. It's nothing. No need to worry about it. I just need to sleep.”

“Well, that part's obvious.” She sounded faintly disdainful. “It's the _why_ that I'm worried about. Come _on_ , Stiles. I'm not blind, nor am I _completely_ ill-informed. I know there's something going on with you and Derek.”

Damn Jackson; that had to be the only way she'd found out. So much for keeping her out of pack business. Because the awkwardness and the strain between himself and Derek was just that, and only that. Just pack business. There was nothing else to it, nothing at all.

Or so he kept telling himself, because to think about the fact that there was a very real problem was... problematic. Obviously. And it certainly wasn't anyone's business but his own, and Derek's. And possibly Raina's, but considering she was an undead possessive spirit bitch, she didn't really count, in Stiles' mind.

“There's nothing going on,” he lied, and pretty poorly at that. Usually he was very adept at skirting around the truth, but right now, he was just too damn tired to lie well, and the look Lydia shot him made that very clear. “Please. So you _haven't_ been all but jumping his bones half the time, and avoiding him the other half?”

Yeah, he was definitely murdering Jackson, because there was no way she could have known about any of _that_ if he hadn't told her. The munin crap had only happened with the pack around, and Stiles wouldn't go so far to call it _half the time_ , either. More like a quarter. Maybe fifteen percent. Or less. The avoidance _far_ outweighed it.

“It's complicated,” he finally managed to respond, feeling like a cop-out for using such a trite, overdone line.

“So's my graduate thesis in theoretical mathematics. Explain.” Lydia never did take no for an answer. She started the car, and Stiles sighed, sinking back into the seat, and tried to come up with the words to make this whole situation make sense.

 

~

 

They ended up back at his house, Lydia curled up in one corner of the couch, Stiles sprawled over the rest, head resting against a pillow propped up against her knee. She was trailing fingers through his hair, and despite how obscenely relaxing the touch was, Stiles was once again too on edge to sleep, though this time it was because he was too involved in their conversation.

He'd managed to explain the munin to her, with much halting and awkwardness as he tried to downplay the various encounters it had forced him into, but she was sharp enough to keep asking for details until he had little choice but to spill the whole sordid story. To her credit, she hadn't laughed at any of it, though she'd raised an eyebrow at the retelling of his accidental assault of Erica, tracing a fingertip over the claw scars still on his face. “I would have done the same thing,” she'd said, but she left it at that, and let him get on with the story.

He trailed off into silence after explaining his last encounter with Derek, and the unfortunate miscommunication Raina had forced between the two of them. Lydia was silent as well for a long moment, but Stiles could practically hear the wheels turning in her mind. She understood, probably better than anyone else would have if he'd tried to tell them about it – although that had more to do with her having all the facts, all the tiniest little details, than any particular insight. Well, that, and she knew Stiles. Maybe not as well as Scott did, but she had that peculiar brand of girl magic that gave her a bit more intuition on certain matters that his best friend would never have.

“You like him.” It was just like her, to condense something so absurd and convoluted into something so simple it almost sounded juvenile, and somehow still manage to make him feel like an idiot. Stiles opened his mouth to protest, but she cut him off, giving him a sharp look. “Please, you would _not_ be this badly off if you were just lusting after his body. You like him, he likes you; why don't you just tell him the munin was lying? There's absolutely no reason for him not to believe that's the truth. From everything you've told me, Raina is a crazy bitch. Lying wouldn't be out of character for her.”

Stiles' brows furrowed, and he pushed himself up so he could look at her, shaking his head. “He doesn't _like_ me. He barely even tolerates me. Wanting in my pants is a different thing.” That was all Derek was interested in, as far as he saw it, and Stiles didn't even understand _that_. Obviously it was just a case of frustration from constant exposure. And yeah, it was nice that Derek wanted _him_ , sans crazy nympho ghost wolf, but it still wasn't--

“God, do you even _listen_ to yourself sometimes, Stiles?” Lydia's voice was cool, the tone perhaps a little harsh, but sometimes, she'd found, bluntness was the only way to get through to Stiles. He could talk himself out of anything, argue with his own knowledge of a situation just to refuse the idea that anything could possibly be good, could possibly be worthwhile. Massive self-worth problems, and he was ripe for a therapist's case study, but she wasn't focusing on that right now. One issue at a time, and eventually the whole would get solved. “He jacked you off in a parking lot, and didn't expect anything in return, even though the munin had you groping him the entire time. He practically chased you out of his house rather than touch you, just because he knew the munin was still there, and you'd both hate yourselves for it if anything happened with Raina in the driver's seat. He _volunteered to be the munin's chew toy_ so you could still heal the pack, Stiles.”

“That's not _liking me_ , that's--”

“What? Pragmatism? No. It'd be far more practical to let Deaton do the healing, and take away any risk to his own safety. It would be much easier to take what he wanted than to fight against it, but he's done nothing but behave himself.” She shot an irritated look at the other. “My god, Stiles, he's been putting himself on the line to save your life for _years_ , and he's never once suggested you stop running with the pack. _He likes you_.”

All Stiles could do was stare at her, gaping. She – it was completely ridiculous, completely and totally crazy, but--

She had a point.

She had a _lot_ of points, actually. All of them made too much sense to ignore when they were spelled out like that.

“So – so, what, I'm supposed to just _tell_ him?” He sounded lost, and a little like a complete idiot, and thankfully Lydia was patient with him, because Stiles was pretty sure he would have given himself up as a lost cause by now. “How am I – how is he going to know for sure that it's not just the munin, again, not just some kind of sick fucked-up joke?”

“He'll know.” She paused a moment, wrinkled her nose slightly. “Evidently, werewolves can smell these things.”

Stiles had to laugh at that, even if he didn't entirely trust that it would work out. It didn't matter, though, because now he had a _plan_ , even if it was a haphazard one at best. A huge weight had slipped off his shoulders, and if yeah, there was still a lot of tension there, at least it was a waiting sort of anxiety. Not just the sense of misery and doom he'd become accustomed to. And if his laugh came off a little hysterical, well, he hadn't slept in like a week. He was pretty sure he was entitled. “Okay. Okay. I'll... try.”

Lydia arched her eyebrows at him, taking in the fact that he still looked practically like a ghost himself. “First, you get a good night's sleep. And maybe a shower.” Her tone was authoritative enough that Stiles knew better than to argue; instead he just laughed again, until his ribs ached with the exertion. To her credit, Lydia didn't look at him like he was a crazy person. She just hugged him, then ushered him off the couch, practically shooing him off to his room.

Girl magic. It didn't matter how often he saw it in action, it was still a mystery to Stiles how well it worked on him.


End file.
